Apart, Across
by effydodge
Summary: After Reichenbach, Sherlock is in love with John, who's married. They're meeting at a strange party full of Mrs. Hudson's elderly friends, continuing to have unvocalized angst. That was a terrible description and I apologize. It's M now, for no reason. There will be more chapters and sometimes porn happens.
1. Chapter 1

On the complete other end of Mrs. Hudson's crowded living room, through billowing clouds of tobacco smoke and cloyingly-floral perfumes, over an array of poorly-reasoned bets piled on the coffee table and even-more-poorly-concealed hands, and moreover past a disturbing hyper-awareness of the sex-lives of the little old ladies present, Sherlock Holmes was coming to the realization that John Watson had gotten him there under false pretenses.

And that John Watson was unendingly stupid and annoying.

And that John Watson only drank beer now and that John Watson was never going to shut up about that pointless, time-sucking honeymoon in India.

Sherlock shifted his cards slightly. In a chair next to him, Mrs. Rothschild smirked and pressed the glasses up her nose. Sherlock watched her from the corner of his eye.

"John, shut up about India. It's boring," he said.

John brought his gaze reluctantly to Sherlock, adjusting it as he went. Blue, warm eyes eclipsed minutely by lowered brows and irritation. It was physical, that look. It was like being pushed backwards. It expressed an appalled, compulsive need to chastise the aberrant element. John was giving him that look because time turned people normal.

"Sherlock, you're clearly the only one not listening at all, so how the hell would you know if it's boring?"

Then John's smirk breaking through the boring and predictable. The smirk that said 'I **know**. But I still really **know**.'

Then: "No, he doesn't have a tell, Mrs. Rothschild. He's doing that on purpose."

And the ladies tittered in response. The drinking had made John even more gregarious. When John smiled, he looked younger than anyone should be allowed under gray hair. Sherlock huffed and sank back to rearranging his hand, a small, corresponding smile on his own face. His heart was busy trying to explode in his chest.

He scooped the chips to his corner without a word, flopping his cards back into the pile. The conversation simmered around him like he'd left the radio on. John laughed while joking about his Mary's cooking, then started talking about how they'd met.

There had probably been a banal segue in there, which Sherlock hadn't felt like hearing. The happy couple had bonded over a shared belief in Sherlock Holmes. Irony. He'd known that before, couldn't even delete it. It just kept coming back.

Mrs. Feint dealt him two aces. He genuinely didn't care. He just swallowed and shifted, placed an appropriate but slightly misleading bet. He glanced up again and John was still smiling, watching him now.

Every time John passed Sherlock to get another beer or to help someone make their way to the door, he ran his hand along Sherlock's back. It was confusing. It tickled and made him angry and he didn't want it to stop.

Sherlock. I miss you. Very much. I really wish you'd respond. JW

Watson. SH

Stop calling me that. JW

But that's your name. There's a party at Mrs. Hudson's in an hour. Something about a baby or a marriage. SH

Or divorce possibly. SH

Maybe a wake. SH

Right… you're asking me to come or you're saying you're busy? JW

She told me to invite you a week ago. SH

Prick. Tell her I'll be there. JW

… This is a very strange party. SH

I said I'll be there. JW

I think it _is _a wake but I can't figure out whose. They've mentioned at least nine different dead people within a span of ten minutes. SH

Don't you dare leave, Sherlock. JW


	2. Chapter 2

When there were only a few people remaining, they relocated the interminable game to the kitchen table. John was by then noticeably impaired. He'd also fallen silent about his marriage, instead undertaking to ask questions of the aged guests. These tended predictably towards war and work. The elderly men and women found his profession endlessly impressive, and the subjects spanned generations.

On the way to the kitchen, he'd leaned firmly against Sherlock's back, his warmth amazingly close. They used to touch like that on strange mornings after long cases when they'd each been too tired to deny the depth of their intimacy. The contact left Sherlock buzzing, incensed, unstable. It felt cruel. John had said he missed him. Brilliant. It sounded like something more, but literally promised nothing. Anyone could miss anyone, it was just words, it floated off like smoke.

John seated himself on the other end of the table.


	3. Chapter 3

John continued talking, set his cards face down while his arm moved in a recognizable fashion under the table. He was manipulating his mobile, periodically glancing down to align his thumb with the keys.

Sherlock's phone buzzed. He pulled it from his jacket, already reluctant.

_Look, we could cheat. JW_

His eyes trained on the incongruent innocence of John's face. He was talking to Mrs. Hudson about sconces or something equally irrelevant. When he turned back with a conspiring look, Sherlock pointedly moved his mobile from his lap. He texted John in full view of the table.

The gesture of defiance met with blank, unchallenging looks all around. No one knew about technology.

_I assume you mean at cards, rather than on your wife. Stop suggesting things without really suggesting them. SH_

John reddened slightly, which Sherlock found infuriating. The man** had** to know what he was doing and yet he had the nerve to blush like that. As if Sherlock was the one being inappropriate. And he still kept his phone hidden as he texted back.

_Sorry. Drunk. JW_

Sherlock just glared. The game had started and he wasn't paying attention. A woman next to him with a very small hat inexplicably patted his hand. He hurriedly accepted the champagne she was offering.

"Are we toasting something?" he asked dully, not looking at her as he keyed in a response. He didn't catch the answer, though he gathered a yes from the raised glasses.

_Yes. You are drunk. SH_

_Well you're letting people win and you're not acting like yourself. SAY something to me. JW_

Sherlock read the message with a blank expression. He then tossed his mobile indifferently over his shoulder.

"Sherlock!" Mrs. Hudson scrambled to her feet. "You almost hit poor Mr. Harrison! Nothing, Mr. Harrison. Drink your tea." Mrs. Hudson leaned over Sherlock, patting his shoulder. She set the mobile by his hand. "Really, Sherlock, he's an older gentleman, very myopic."

"Then he wouldn't have known who to blame, would he?" Sherlock responded stiffly.

"Really! Must you be so careless with everything? Even your own property? For heaven's sake!"

"What's your name again, young man?" someone asked. Someone dissatisfied with the events that had just transpired.

"Sherlock Holmes," John answered for him.

Sherlock looked at the table, straightening his cards into a neat pile while Mrs. Hudson resumed her seat.

"What?" The person was either hard of hearing or refused to recognize the name.

"Sherlock Holmes," Sherlock said. He drew in a breath and began speaking very quickly. "But there's no reason to hear it properly and even less reason to remember it. I know Mrs. Hudson through her ex-husband, whom she'd have been better off not knowing in the first place. If you ever know me, which is unlikely nearing impossible, it will certainly be owning to some tragic circumstances befalling you or a loved one. A murder, a theft, an interesting kidnapping perhaps. And really under those circumstances, I'd love a glass of bubbly and cup of tea with you all. We'd have a wonderful ole time. But now? Right now? My ex-partner is throwing a tiff because I've been letting you all win for the past four hours and because I'm ignoring him. Although it's curious that he only started complaining about my behavior when he got through telling asinine personal anecdotes about elephants and marital bliss. A bit self-obsessed, don't you think, John?"

Mrs. Hudson's mouth was hanging open. John just hung his head and pushed his chair back to stand.

"I need to talk to you in the hall, Sherlock." The tone was menacing and tired.

Sherlock ran a hand over his mobile, hesitant. The second he stood, he'd be walking towards redundant rejection. With a petulant glance at no one in particular, he pocketed the phone and made his way ahead of John.


	4. Chapter 4

Sherlock paced the length of the hall, turning when he heard the door clicking shut behind him. John was staring back with an expression slightly more naked now they were alone. At least he was affected. That was something to note. Even if he wasn't behaving anywhere near rationally in response.

Sherlock ran both hands through his hair. John followed the motion with his eyes and Sherlock watched the recognition settling on his face. Fine, it was a gesture of frustration. It wasn't as if his frustrations were a secret.

He snapped at John, "Yes, what? You were angry with me. Please elaborate on it quickly. Do you realize there are seventeen different types of cat hair in that room and half the carriers are allergic?" The last had been bothering him for hours.

John gave a small laugh and pushed himself from the door, closing the distance between them a bit too quickly. He swayed, closed his eyes briefly and leaned on the wall. Sherlock warmed at the proximity, his rage marginally abating as he watched John closely. All the same he huffed at John's play for physical contact and refused to help. Together they smelled the way their flat used to smell.

"Let's start with… then," John said. He shook his head of swimming thoughts, then nodded when he found the right one. "Do you realize how often you refer to me as your ex-partner? D'you realize what that sounds like?"

That question and yet John was inching closer. Sherlock clenched his jaw. The pads of John's fingers made a slow, aching sound along the wallpaper. He was dimly aware of his own body reacting, how much he was squirming. There was an itching in his hands, behind his eyes and knees.

"I very seldom find it necessary to refer to you at all," he answered irritably.

John laughed. "Only because you never see me. And you only never see me because you never return my calls, Sherlock. And you haven't gotten this riled up because you're indifferent to all–"

"You're useless on cases!"

John looked up at him with big, hurt eyes. Sherlock took a quick breath to marginally soften the edge on his voice. "In particular as a married man with a regular job. Too hampered by organization. My needs come at odd times and you know that, John."

John ruffled. "You're talking about business needs, not your –"

"Yes, you _miss_ me," he snapped, jumping ahead. "That sentiment is proving deeply irrelevant."

"Yes. I miss you. That's what friends do and you know it's not -"

"Yes, exactly, John. Exactly. You miss playing house with a _friend_. You miss making _appropriate _life plans but then getting mercifully distracted from them by a sudden uptick in danger. You can't get that back and also have your lovely, normal life in the suburbs with the returning limp and the decreasing need for motility. Don't you see they mutually contradict?"

John took an uneven breath, eyes on Sherlock's lips. He hadn't wanted to hear that and by the look on his face Sherlock could tell he still refused to know it. Hence the alcohol, no doubt.

He suddenly leaned again Sherlock's chest with closed eyes, nuzzled his forehead once against Sherlock's neck.

Then Sherlock cleared his throat and broke away. He moved around John, opened the door and found his way back to the party. He was almost blind with rage when he seated himself at the table. He picked up his cards, glanced quickly around, placed a bet and felt Mrs. Hudson's hand on his shoulder. That's when he remembered to breathe.


	5. Chapter 5

Sherlock offered no explanation for what had just transpired, nor did he acknowledge John's continued absence, which came as no surprise to him.

He'd brought back a palpable tension. His breathing was sharp, his back was straight and tense and he kept assaulting his own hair. No one wanted to speak to him, which he worked in his favor. Now he could focus – really **think**.

Mr. Harrison had been abruptly moved to the seat on his left, where Mrs. Rothschild had presumably dragged him. He was just sitting there blankly, blocking her cards with a look of mute apprehension behind thick frames. And she was guarding that hand jealously. Too jealously. It didn't spread to her eyes. She wasn't toying with her lip in actual excitement, more in mimicry of such. No actual tearing of her lip. It was an act. Conclusion: a mediocre hand.

Further along, Mrs. Hudson was at a loss without John next to her, and moreover kept shooting harassed, concerned little looks at Sherlock. She didn't care about the game enough to bet properly, or to even have a tell, but she was holding her cards loosely. She was practically shouting them at the whole table. Conclusion: two pair, low.

To his immediate right, Mrs. Feint in the tiny hat was humming and clinking her dentures. He'd already realized the denture-clicking meant she was thinking. And judging by that impractical wardrobe and that barrage of clashing, expensive jewelry, she didn't think very deeply when experiencing a windfall of luck. Conclusion: a terrible hand.

Sherlock wordlessly won three games in a row.

"In my day…" Mr. Harrison muttered, without finishing.

Mrs. Rothschild smirked at him and crouched further down the table. "I'm wise to your shenanigans, young man," she declared. "Let's see those arms. You've got cards in there. Roll up your sleeves." She patted her own hand on the table.

He grimaced and complied.

"Having a functioning intellect is 'cheating' as much as knowing you've recently contracted chlamydia is a 'party trick.'"

Mrs. Hudson seized on the moment. "John's gone home has he?"

"Don't be ridiculous. He's in my bedroom."

Mrs. Hudson spluttered and Sherlock began to deal the next hand. When the cards were out and all four people had cleared their throats - all mindless talk of azaleas having ceased abruptly - he gave a long-suffering sigh.

"Well, he's too drunk to have gone home, too John to still be in the hallway. Logical conclusion, he's wandered back to 221B, and he's both angry with me and nostalgic, so he's checking my bedroom for cocaine. Also, he's been texting me this whole time-"

Mrs. Rothschild scoffed and he cut her off, "That's not cheating that's utilizing technology!"

He exchanged challenging looks with Mrs. Rothschild until she relaxed into a huddle with Mr. Harrison. He glanced at the rest of the table, flinched at the motherly, scolding expression on Mrs. Hudson's face. It wasn't fair, that look. He muttered and handed over his mobile.

_I still have my key, you know. JW_

_Obviously. SH_

_Shut up. JW_

_We weren't playing house. JW_

_You are a hoarder. JW_

_Why don't I just drop in on you? Why do I care about an invitation? JW_

_You're afraid of what you might find. SH _

_Your collection of dehydrated organs? Already found that. JW_

_Who you might find. SH_

He watched Mrs. Hudson carefully. Her opinion on the subject mattered more than he liked to admit. She'd been the one to tell him about John's engagement. Not even John had been able to broach the subject once Sherlock returned. There had been several reunion meetings, filled with increasingly obvious omissions, and though Sherlock had known from the start – God, the signs were practically neon and flashing – the actual words from her mouth had hurt. Irrationally hurt.

He vaguely remembered the wrenching, whimpering sound he'd heard coming from his own throat.

Mrs. Hudson glanced at him over the mobile with a look that said 'Stop answering him, then.'

John ran a hand over Sherlock's unmade bed, smoothing the warm sheets, before he just gave in and climbed under the covers. John used to sleep there. Sometimes. Not often, but sometimes. Whenever the nightmares came back. He shelved it in his mind as PTSD, and anyway he shelved the whole of his relationship with Sherlock as unusual, atypical. It didn't follow the mold of an ordinary friendship and he'd stopped trying to control it.

Now he pulled the blankets over his head, willing away his stupor. God, how he missed uncontrollable. Uncontrollable fixed him.

Before 221B, John used to have dreams about the war, some more nightmarish than others. Sometimes he'd see himself in action, the war all around churning out debris and bodies. That, he could handle. He served a function in that. He sewed up the wounded. It was cathartic.

The bad dreams used to start the same as the good. Some explosion, some influx of bodies, some need for a Doctor John Watson with steady hands and a sharp mind. But they'd flicker out at a high point of adrenaline, before he could fix anything. They'd lead him up a hill, make him survey mayhem from a distance and then they'd wake him, sweaty, impotent and faraway. He'd wake up having failed.

The dreams changed when he moved in with Sherlock. He began to sew bodies with a tall, brilliant man looking over his shoulder. He practiced impossible works under impossible circumstances, resurrecting corpses dragged from the Thames, performing surgeries in open fields. And Sherlock would crouch, tell him exactly how unsterile the work was, how impossible, how restoring life to dead organic matter was the work of gothic madmen.

"There are no heroes, John," he usually whispered in John's ear. "Caring about them won't save them."

Still, they were good dreams more or less. Under the covers, John pulled the phone from his pocket and sent another text.

_I keep having this dream. I'm looking for you in the wrong building. JW_


	6. Chapter 6

(Hey, you guys – I realized this morning how lazily I'd written the beginning part of Chapter 5 so I went back and tried to fix it. Among other things, now it talks more about the other people at the table and is more in Sherlock's mind, so please take a look. Sorry for the inconvenience! Thanks for reading and I hope you're enjoying the story! 3)

Sherlock's eyes dropped, alighted on the beeping mobile, then jumped back again to Mrs. Hudsons', beseeching. His chest suddenly ached, needing to read John's new message. It was an awful, stinging, swarming sensation. It certainly wasn't Sherlock's - Sherlock's body never did things like that - nor was it a product of his intentions. John obviously owned that sensation. John pulled the strings on that sensation.

And Mrs. Hudson's eyes – they read the text calmly, growing in calmness, brimming with frustrating, endless **understanding**. An understanding which despite everything he'd never really be able to touch on his own. He'd never be able to make John do anything important – certainly never stop any of this. So what good was understanding without power to manipulate based on that understanding, to foster the desired response? It was no good at all, it was just air and pain, and he couldn't have it in his life anymore. Mrs. Hudson was right to shake her head and keep the phone away and he knew that and yet the psychotic hallucination of an aching heart kept right on going.

She dialed a number while Sherlock just sat there. Complaisance softened his features.

"Mary, dear?" Mrs. Hudson asked politely. Evidently she received an affirmative response and continued. "Yes, this is Mrs. Hudson, love. Your husband's had a few too many I'm afraid. Such a wonderful man, yes, perhaps too affable but of course there are worse qualities, aren't there?"

Sherlock wanted to leave. His forehead hurt from furrowing and his nails were digging into the kitchen table.

"Oh, Mary Watson? Is Mary coming now?" Mrs. Feint asked, hat tipping on her head. She pulled on a string of pearls.

Mrs. Hudson nodded, mouth open as John's wife prattled audibly through the receiver.

Sherlock growled and Mrs. Feint glanced over in vacant surprise.

"Something I need to give her, you know," Mrs. Feint added. Sherlock didn't know. His mind had been recording the conversations about Mary, but he hadn't been actively listening. He scanned through quickly, found the corresponding exchange and nodded gruffly.

"Indian connection," he muttered.

"Yes, my son knew her father of course," Mrs. Feint repeated herself.

"How lovely for them," he answered.

"Yes, yes, lovely. Both dead now but, lovely no doubt. Such a colorful country, isn't it? Took a grand-niece there to see the Ganges. The food went straight through me. Not my-"

Sherlock groaned over the remainder of her commentary and Mrs. Hudson hung up the phone. She stood, pocketing it. "I'll go check on him dear, get him some tea, you just continue chatting."


	7. Chapter 7

Mary Watson was a reasonable woman, in no way stupid. She replaced the receiver on her land-line telephone because she was an old-fashioned woman, too. She sighed and took a seat, looked around her small flat.

John was drunk at Mrs. Hudson's, which of course meant Sherlock. Drinking on its own would've meant Sherlock. Would've done before his miraculous return from the dead, and certainly did now. Increasingly many things meant Sherlock. Grumpy after work meant Sherlock, wearing an old, thread-bare jumper meant Sherlock.

Mary Watson wasn't a stupid woman, but she was an even less reactionary one. These things were side-notes in the larger picture of their marriage, their life together. And even if John's feelings for Sherlock weren't entirely platonic, then throwing a tantrum would hardly make it any better.

She daintily lit a cigarette, waited patiently for her companion to return from the loo. She blew a smoke-ring and admired her work with a sharp eye, smiled softly as the sound of a door opening down the hall. She patted the neat little chignon at the back of her head.

Jim Moriarty shuffled in with an annoyed backward glance.

"The 'his and hers' bath towels were overkill," he commented.

"You're certainly the expert on overkill," she said. Her tone was slightly petulant, despite her best intentions, and she stubbed out the dying butt to light another.

"The good doctor lets you smoke now?"

He took the seat opposite and she shrugged. His foot never completely stopped moving. It just shook out an obscene rhythm across his knee as he fell into apparent malaise.

"Ah, well he probably misses the smell," he said.

Her lack of response spurred him on. "Sense memory. Missing his long lost love… Sherlock Holmes…" and his voice became strained. "The criminally **booooring**."

She waited for him to finish, then said, "Well, someone's in love with him."

He leaned abruptly forward, slamming the point of a knife into the formica. He stared up at her, face very near the table, eyes wide and empty. His whole body seemed to vibrate with restraint, a visible threat of violence. "No, no, sweetie," he said. Suddenly something bothered him and he whined and rubbed at his forehead. "Obsession. Not love. Love is a positive noun. Hence 'lovely.' No, no. We mustn't degrade the English language any further." He slackened, satisfied with the shock in her eyes, with the smell of fear. He was carnal about these things, like a dog. And he pulled back the knife, apparently shaking away the wave of emotion with a warm smile. Some of it spread to his eyes, making them shine in the light.

She squinted at him, sitting back slightly, thinking. She brought the filter end of the cigarette to her lip. "All that aggression and yet they live."

He waved an annoyed hand. "Well circumstances alter, don't they, Mary? I can't be held accountable for everything."

"What changed?" She let a tone of mocking slip into her voice. "Was it your heart, Jim? Did it grow three sizes?"

Before not answering, he smiled with a slight shake of his head. "Yes, very good. Your father's daughter to the end. I had Sebastian mention levity in the old man's eulogy, no reason he can't mention it in yours as well."

At that, she took another long drag, stiffening around the smoke in her lungs.

"I have to go," she said, hoarsely. "They're together even now. Seems he's gotten himself drunk."

"Of course he has." He slid a folded envelope from inside his suit jacket, pressed it against the table.

When she touched the packet, he made a tsking sound, not letting it go.

"Say thank you," he said.

"Thank you, Jim."


	8. Chapter 8

The living room of 221B had seen better days. It had seen worse, but then at the time its sole inhabitant had been dead.

John hadn't occupied the flat in Sherlock's absence, but neither had Mrs. Hudson rented it out again. There had been vague talk over drinks about turning it into a Sherlock Holmes museum, but generally only John and Molly thought the idea had any merit.

There was no longer a three-year layer of dust on everything. There was, however, a literal box of bones in the corner, a broken accordion on the coffee table and ten stacked apple boxes in front of the bookshelf. Maybe twenty percent of the books were actually on the shelves and there was a saber protruding from the wall.

"Really, Sherlock," Mrs. Hudson muttered to herself, taking it all in.

She lifted a men's fashion magazine to tidy up. A pile of gruesome crime scene photos skittered to the floor. With a shocked cry, she dropped the whole project and put the kettle on.

"John?" she called.

Sure enough, a muttered response came from Sherlock's room. Honestly, the man was always right. But the voice sounded a bit muffled.

She left the kettle to go see.

What she found made her gasp and clutch her necklace. It was a pitiful sight, honestly. Not the first time she'd seen John in Sherlock's bed, but certainly the first in many years.

"Oh, really, dear," Mrs. Hudson puttered over, patting John's shoulder. "Love, you know whose bed you're in? No telling what strange experiments happen in this room."

John groaned and covered his head with the blanket. The images swimming to his mind were quite graphic.

"Yes, I know, quite a handful that man. But that's why we love him, isn't it?"

At John's second groan, she rubbed his back and softened her voice. "Tea's on, dear, and there are a few biscuits in the cupboard, you'll feel right as rain." She sighed slightly. "And I've called Mary. She's on her way."

John's spine went rigid under her hand. "Does Sherlock know that?"

She huffed. "And how would I keep it from him?"

John sat up, rubbing his eyes. "And he hasn't left yet?"

"Well as far as I know, he's still downstairs. Taking advantage of senility, the hooligan."

She jumped at the sound of the kettle whistling.

John drank two cups of tea. As calmly as possible, he tried to get his head around seeing Mary in 221B, seeing Mary interact with Sherlock at all. He hadn't seen that since the wedding, which had absolutely redefined the term 'fiasco.' In the first breath of his best man speech, Sherlock had outed three different people in the wedding party. He'd also explained ad nauseum how diseases spread when people dance 'incorrectly,' given the most recent London divorce rates, reminded everyone that husbands and wives are always the first suspects in cases of homicide, given an historical account of what marriage 'really' signifies, a scientific breakdown of the urine content in wedding mints, and then somehow or other, he'd convinced the wait staff to mutiny and withhold an entire crate of champagne.

He sighed heavily, heard another cry of protest from Mrs. Hudson. She'd begun cleaning the living room again. But this cry was different, higher and more specifically chastising.

Sherlock walked into the bedroom. He walked smoothly, but with very evident purpose. He locked the door behind him.

John was still in bed, the cup of tea cradled in his hands. His face glowed with innocence. There was a moment of pause as Sherlock took in the sight of John under his covers, looking perfectly at home.

John smiled timidly.

"Um… Let me guess. You're here to spoon me?" he joked.

Sherlock didn't react, he appeared to be thinking. His eyes weren't connecting with any one thing. "You're even more idiotic than usual and you smell like a distillery."

John winced, his head beginning to pound. "No reason for that, I admit I've had too many."

"Approximately two hours before you recover your mental faculties."

"Well I'm still well capable of taking offense."

"Well, that couldn't be more obvious. You tried to hug me, I refused you and you stormed off to curl up in my bed like a petulant child." He sighed. His voice had strained on that last. "But as ever, you've missed the point."

John swallowed more tea. He closed his eyes as the warm liquid filled him, felt it coat his throat and stomach. "Yeah, what's the point then?"

Sherlock promptly sat on the edge of the bed, uncontrollably smiling. "Found a case."

"Yeah? And you need your bed for it?"

"I need you for it."

"Oh shut the hell up, two minutes ago you said –"

"I know what I said, it was actually an hour ago and this is different, John. It involves you."

"Oh, how?"

"Well, Mary. It involves Mary, an eighty year old woman and a treasure map scrawled on an old, Indian cigar box."

John set down his tea and covered his face. Sherlock waited patiently. Finally John looked up, inexplicably red all over.

"These are the kinds of things I had to defend when people thought you were a fraud. D'you… do you ever appreciate how difficult that was to do?"

Sherlock chose his words carefully. "Well… yes. You failed at it. So I assume it was fairly difficult."

"Oh for the love of –"

"Think about it," Sherlock's voice had turned stiff. "But I can guarantee your wife's cooperation."

Then Sherlock was getting up, and then he was suddenly gone.

Seconds later, John heard him in the living room. He was explaining to Mrs. Hudson the scientific purpose of a stack of porn.


	9. Chapter 9

The old woman – Mrs. Feint – was flustered, very evidently. Sherlock found it irritating. If anyone in the room deserved to be flustered, it was obviously him, and yet somehow he managed to rise above.

**He** was the one who couldn't help **seeing** everything. He was the one whose mind pushed itself beyond capacity, constantly, incessantly surging forward, totally indifferent to the world's ability to keep up, least of all to the physical and emotional tolls being taken. Cocaine had helped, tobacco to a lesser degree. They'd calmed the frayed nerves of his frantic mind like emollients on the skin. They'd loosed him from habitual avenues of thought, helped him see around thick, otherwise opaque corners. God, what he'd give to have that back. But there was no point. He'd pushed that as far as it could go. Drugs were good for sprints, not for marathons, and he'd elected at some point or other to live beyond forty.

They'd formed a small, extremely reluctant cabal in Mrs. Hudson's kitchen, while Mrs. Hudson herself had scuttled the other party-goers into the living room. Mary was in the process of moving her shoulder bag to the kitchen counter. She was still refusing to remove her coat, shooting small, questioning glances at Sherlock as he paced behind the old woman's chair. John wrapped an arm around his wife's waist. He was pulling her close, angling her in front of him like a shield. It was the new 'I'm not gay' knee-jerk response.

Mrs. Feint spluttered, clicking her dentures, shifting Sherlock's attention back to her.

"Oh, honestly, just repeat what you told me," he prompted.

"That… That I have an old snuff box…"

"Cigar box. You said cigar box. Distinction's immaterial. Please go on."

"I have an old… box… And it's, well, it's your Mary's." She was looking at John, then at Mary, unsure of whom to address. "She knows young Sebastian Moran… Do you not?"

Mary bit the forefinger of her glove, pulling it off with her teeth. Her coat was damp. She'd either left the flat recently, without checking the weather, or she'd left a while ago only to be caught without an umbrella. Something about her scarf was off – the angles. From a distance, Sherlock was fairly certain someone else had tied it for her. But the data was too steeped in minutia, too unquantifiable, and for that reason, regrettably, he was forced to reject it as evidence.

"Fleetingly," she admitted. Evidently she was annoyed to find the story grounded in fact.

Mrs. Feint kept talking.

"Yes. Strapping young lad, just started at uni, friend of my grandson's. Their fathers knew each other of course. They go for hunts together on weekends. My grandson really only goes to impress a young lady he fancies, never fires, the poor dear, wouldn't hurt a –"

Sherlock groaned loudly, disgusted with the anecdote. He resumed pacing around the table in a vain attempt to keep himself quiet.

"Yes…" John said. He released hold of Mary to sit at the table. He was watching Sherlock warily, but then his attention turned completely to Mrs. Feint.

"Yes, Mrs…." - he'd forgotten her name - "Your grandson sounds like me. Guns never really held much appeal when I was at uni. Now, that cigar box… it belongs to him?"

Sherlock shot him a look that said: _God, stop being friendly. _John answered the look with an expression of tightly-pursed lips and narrowed eyes: his facial approximation of an expletive.

"No, no!" Mrs. Feint answered. "It belongs to Mary of course!"

Mary scoffed, "Because I know a young man your son hunts with?"

Mrs. Feint nodded. "Yes, dear."

Mary raised an eyebrow. Then she raised both, her superciliousness fading as true confusion set it. "He took an English literature course of mine, fixed my rain gutters once, certainly never gave me an old box." Her eyes flickered to Sherlock, who ignored her in favor of glaring off at nothing.

Mrs. Feint rambled on.

"Your father knew his father, too. And my son. Probably why he took your course, certainly why he's friends with my grandson. You see, Colonel Moran, my husband and Professor Morstan invested in an Indian corporation together quite some time ago. It did very well. Of course all three are deceased now."

Mary made an indistinguishable little sound. She spoke through her teeth, sarcastic but not entirely hostile. "Yes, thank you. I'm quite aware my father is deceased."

Sherlock's reserve snapped. "Yes, we're all aware they're all deceased! Everyone's deceased! I've been at this party for six hours and so far you've only mentioned teenagers and people who are deceased! None of this is important!"

John turned on him. "What's important then, Sherlock!? You're going to give her a heart attack!"

Mary covered a laugh with her hand and busied herself putting the gloves in her purse.

"She's… oh, honestly. It belongs to _Mary_." He stood up straighter, looking around at everyone in awe. "Are you honestly not understanding this?" He was smiling in vague amusement, waiting, nearly enjoying the reveal now.

Then Mary put a hand on John's shoulder. Her eyes were calm, unchallenging and John immediately leaned back into it. As if to underline the routine acceptability of that touch, he fucking **sighed**.

Sherlock's mind lurched. Suddenly he was focusing on John and Mary, heatedly, completely beyond control. Microscopic traces of coral-colored lipstick on John's lower lip. The light scent of lavender potpourri on his jumper. The weight he'd lost for the wedding and mostly kept off. His clothes: well-washed, well-matched. Conclusion: she picked out his clothes, washed them, folded them in neat little drawers, cooked for him probably. Furthermore, upon her arrival that evening, his gait had changed, had become more emphatically straight-backed and controlled. Then the vividly-remembered fact that he'd returned from his honeymoon with dog-tag marks on the back of his neck, extremely suggestive that he'd worn them during intercourse. Conclusion: Mary had a military fetish which John enjoyed indulging. Follow-up conclusion: they enjoyed a still-active sex-life.

Sherlock closed his eyes to regain his train of thought. "Tell them why it's Mary's, Mrs. Feint." His voice sounded strange. Only an idiot wouldn't have noticed.

"H-her father left it for her."

He took an overly-sharp breath, sat at the table. John was looking at him with concern. Sherlock shook this off, returned to the thing that mattered: the case. The game. The joy of the chase. Without that, his mind shriveled to nothing. Without that stimulation he might as well curl up in bed and die.

He focused on Mrs. Feint and smiled. "If her father left her something, why doesn't she have it yet?" He gave a stiff portrayal of confusion that sounded mostly tired and bored.

"Well, we weren't-"

"Could it be you didn't know who you were looking for?"

"Y-yes. We thought her name was-"

"Obviously. You only found the box within the past year, sometime after she got married and dropped 'Morstan' completely, something quite suggestive in and of itself."

"W…we didn't know who she was until Sebastian found the name on her faculty page. Her maiden name was listed with her credentials."

"Yes. But more importantly…" He paused for emphasis, grinning. This was the good part. This was what got him up in the morning. "The cigar box belongs to **Mary**."

He leaned back, glanced cheerily over at John and Mary, whose expressions were mirror images of vacancy, John's edged in anticipation, Mary's in impatience. He continued. "Given the time lapse in finding it, it must've been somewhere old, somewhere things can sit and sit and sit without being seen. Unfrequented."

"We have a … sort of a crawl space. I can't get up there myself anymore. Jack's the one. My grandson. He went looking for some of his father's things."

Sherlock smiled. "Then how did you know it was **Mary**'s? Surely everyone's dead who would've known for sure."

"There was a note."

Sherlock leaned back in his chair as Mary surged forward, the buckle of her coat clanging against the table. "A _note_?"

"Yes, dear," Mrs. Feint said, uncertainly.

John laughed. He turned to stare at Sherlock in awe. "Oh, you… you couldn't have just /started/ there?"

"It was obvious from the start, John. How else to identify something old, yet recently-discovered? Obviously there was a note."

"You absolute lunatic." John's eyes were sparkling, tracking him, **fond** of him. Sherlock couldn't look away from that look – it was completely intoxicating. In his peripheral vision he saw Mary just staring at Mrs. Feint with her mouth open.

"I'm not sure… not sure I understand," said Mrs. Feint. "Is it important that there's a note? It's extremely brief."

Mary pulled up a chair and sat at the table. She lit herself a cigarette, seemingly disinterested in answering for herself.

John patted Mary's wrist, bravely overlooking the smoking. "Yes. It's… Mary's father left… when her mother was only two months pregnant. No communication at all. And he died without ever contacting her. We weren't even sure he knew she existed." He suddenly flinched and glared across the table at Sherlock. "Hold on. Sherlock, you said a treasure map."

"Figurative."

"Oh, honestly."

Sherlock sighed in matching irritation. "Well you never know with posthumous notes do you? And boxes. Mrs. Feint said it's heavy, it could very well have a false bottom, you never know."


End file.
